Reflections of a Barometer
While they are fresh in my mind, I want to share some of my feelings of being
a barometer student in Blaine’s Spanish class this week. Sorry, this may
get long. Although it was frustrating to be a slow student, I am grateful I had
the experience. Perhaps the biggest thing I learned from the class pertained
to barometers.
On the first day, I took a back seat in class because I like to hide in a
crowd. The first thing Blaine said was that all beginning Spanish students
should move front and center to “help him” teach. He then said something like,
“It’s my job to made sure you learn but you are actually responsible for your own
learning. If you don’t understand, it’s because you don’t tell me.” Half
way through the first day, one of the self-identified barometers who was sitting
right up front stopped Blaine and admitted he was totally lost. Blaine
thanked him profusely and said, “You are doing a wonderful job as a student. I
need you to help me teach better.” All week he praised the barometers over and
over for stopping him and “helping me be a better teacher” (this said by the
master teacher!). It became his theme song. It never felt like a put-down. He
never made us feel that he was discouraged with the pace or that we should
remember what he had just told us and had already forgotten. Rather, if someone
forgot, he said, “Oh, I need to work on that more” or “That helps me so
much.” I was surprised to read that he went much slower than he usually does
because to me it never felt slow. He did stop often to repeat or explain a
word. Often I didn’t need it but it felt good to get reinforcement. He was
constantly asking one of us for feedback. I don’t know how the superstars felt but
to me it was a good pace. Also, I liked his technique of assigning key words
to particular students. “John, cuando is your word.” Then he always stopped
and asked John to translate that word when it came up. It was a
nonthreatening way to reinforce an important word.
I gave a lot of thought to being a slow learner in the class. Three things
stand out as I reflect on my experience. None of this is new information but
experiencing it is different from knowing it. First, we all bring a different
framework or “wiring” that already exists in our brains depending on prior
language experience, etc. I had immense interference from what was already in
the foreign language part of my brain. I was very frustrated that I could not
bypass that. It was extremely interesting to me when Shelley said that our
first language (and I suppose any number of languages which are acquired by a
certain age?) are in a different section of the brain. (Shelley, please share
more brain research with us.) Because I processed through a language which is
very different from Spanish - Japanese - it took me much much longer. Lots
of structures made no sense to me that felt pretty natural to others. I found
that I could learn words but could not make sense of the structure until I
had the vocab down. I could feel myself gradually building a new framework to
replace the Japanese framework which kept coming forward. This is what our
kids are doing. Sometimes the words I knew didn’t make sense when I listened
because I could not separate them from the whole phrase, therefore they weren’t
recognizable. Every time I had to think about words - a lot at first - , I
could not think about structure. Sometimes I thought too long on an early word
and missed the rest of the sentence. Pauses helped immensely. Also, reading
helped. I could see the whole sentence, and the pop-up explanations helped me
make sense of the structure. Also, I found that using names and places which
did not sound and look like Spanish made the process much easier.
Although our students may not have other languages to interfere, their
experience and aptitude with language in general is different for each kid.
Wouldn’t it be reassuring to tell kids, “Language has nothing to do with being dumb
or smart. Even if you feel that you are slower than others, you are not dumb.
We are each wired differently and will acquire this new language in
different ways and at different speeds.” I think they need to be told that over and
over. I had to tell myself that all week and I am not an insecure teenager.
The second big element was the emotional factor. I noticed that any time my
stress level rose, my receptivity went way down. All week I felt that for
me to concentrate, I needed to just listen. I was not forced to answer the
questions or produce which would have increased my stress level. (This is
opposite of what Von said so it shows that we need to sometimes ask the kids what
feels right for them.) We did only one paired retell and I hated it. Being
forced to do a lot of writing or retelling, especially with the consequence of a
grade, would have been destructive for me at the stage where I was. Now I
am rethinking the way I have done freewrites. Although I know it is true that
fluency comes when we are willing to plunge ahead and make mistakes, for some
of us that is extremely difficult and stressful, at least at first. I knew
this was true of course, but after feeling it, now I will be more patient with
hesitant students. I hated the free write that we did on the last day
because for me it was high stress. I did, however, like Blaine’s comment that we
should challenge ourselves to think in the new language. So on the long drive
home, I mentally told a long story without the stress of assessment. With no
one listening or reading to know about ineptitude, it freed me of the stress.
Reducing stress in the classroom is more important than I realized. This also
includes allowing students to “check out” sometimes when they need to. One
afternoon I had a terrific headache and was feeling horribly incompetent, so no
matter what Blaine did, I could not concentrate very well.
My third big realization was the importance of visuals. Many people
commented on this. When we were introduced to a new word, I had to hear it and see
it. When the pronunciation didn’t match my expectations, it was harder to
acquire. The question words were on the board all week and although I knew them, I
occasionally would forget again when they came up in a new context. A quick
glance at the board was helpful. I continued to feel that some visual help
with the pronoun differences would have helped me acquire them. Blaine said
that charts, etc., are just distracting and he is usually right, but I
continued to feel a need to put some visual organization into what he was explaining
about the confusing pronouns. l am now planning ways to increase visual
clues in my lessons. Even pointing to guide words during the story helped me.
If you are still reading - sorry this is so long - I encourage all of you to
take a week of language class. It was a fabulous experience. A big thanks
to Blaine and Shelly and all who helped. I would love to go again next year to
see if I can add to the new framework which started to build in my brain.
It should be interesting - the Aflac duck will be there too. 
Louise
